Lightspeed Seeds Social Gamer Casual Collective

Casual Collective, a Berkshire, England-based social gaming site, has raised $1 million in seed funding from Lightspeed Venture Partners. The company was formed by game developers Paul Preece and David Scott, who created both Desktop Tower Defense and Flash Element TD. 

 

PRESS RELEASE

World-renowned indie game developers Paul Preece and David Scott — the creators of blockbuster Web game hits Desktop Tower Defense and Flash Element TD — today announced the launch of Casual Collective, a free-to-play social gaming site featuring a range of new Web games created exclusively by Preece and Scott. In the coming months, Casual Collective will introduce an ongoing stream of new titles on its site, with features and content exclusive to Casual Collective, as well as distribute titles to a host of other top game destination sites across the Web.

 

Anticipating rapid growth in 2009, Casual Collective has also secured a seed investment of $1 million from Lightspeed Venture Partners. A leading VC firm, Lightspeed, has a strong track record in consumer Internet start-ups, including RockYou, the definitive leader in widgets for the social Web, as well as Serious Business, makers of FriendsForSale, one of FaceBook’s most popular social games, among others.

 

“Paul and David have been instrumental in fueling the indie developer revolution and free-to-play gaming market,” noted Jeremy Liew, managing director and social media investment expert at Lightspeed. “Desktop Tower Defense and Flash Element TD have demonstrated the tremendous opportunities that can be created around viral, social gaming. With the launch of Casual Collective and their newest round-up of engaging titles – Paul and David are turning the next page in the industry.”

 

Preece’s signature game Desktop Tower Defense, released in March 2007, has become one of the most successful and popular indie games in history and is considered the world over as highly “addicting.” Since its debut, the game has been played over 70 million times – representing more than 10 million hours of global playing time. Co-founder David Scott, is also the creator of Flash Element TD, Flash Circle TD, and Vector Tower Defense. His first and most popular game – Flash Element TD – spawned more than 140 million downloads worldwide in 2007 alone. The collective successes of Preece and Scott have transformed them from late-night hobbyists into two of the most high-profile indie game developers in the world.

 

“With Casual Collective, we hope to extend the success of Desktop Tower Defense and Flash Element TD with the next generation of free-to-play games – supported by a community tailor made for the social, multi-player experience,” noted Preece, CEO and co-founder of Casual Collective. “With the tremendous success of our previous titles, we see a huge opportunity to provide even more gaming experiences to a broadening player base. Our goal with Casual Collective is to reach an even wider audience with a variety of game genres from puzzle and platform, to strategy, and more,” added Scott, co-founder of Casual Collective.

 

Casual Collective’s premiere new game line-up includes:

 

Desktop Tower Defense 1.9: An eagerly awaited update to the hugely successful DTD series, this version delivers extra single player modes, new graphics and real-time multi-player capabilities, where up to six players compete to be the first to defeat each ‘wave’ of creeps.

Minions: A multi-player game where two teams of six go head-to-head to push their way through the opposing players defenses and into their main base. Each player controls a single ‘Minion’ who gains experience and upgrades as the game progresses. With eight Minions to pick from, each with three special abilities ranging from RPG’s to teleportation, no two battles are alike!

Buggle Stars: Guide your Buggle through 20 unique levels, collecting stars as you go. Each level has something new, interesting and challenging to do. Race down the highway, dive deep in the ocean, avoid Buggle-seeking missiles, and pilot a space craft in this fast-paced platform game.

Farragomate: Ever played with those wordy fridge magnets to make up funny, clever or interesting sentences? In Farragomate, players challenge up to 10 others against the clock to construct the very best sentence (or Farrago) they can in the time allowed. Players vote for their favorite, then the words are jumbled up and another round begins!

Additionally, Casual Collective will showcase four more games, Buggle Connect, Attack of the Buggles, Flash Element TD 2.0, and Desktop Armada I that are available on the site, and have also been distributed to other leading free-to-play sites, including Kongregate, Addicting Games, Hall Pass, Newgrounds, and I-Am-Bored.com, to name a few.

 

On Casual Collective, players will play and interact within a highly social community, where they maintain a personal profile complete with their continuous scores and progress, and where they can earn points and awards for their successes. Casual Collective players will also have the opportunity to purchase game add-ons for their favorite titles, such as exclusive levels and modes.

 

About Casual Collective

 

Casual Collective is a new top contender in social gaming and renowned developer of pioneering indie Web games such as the award-winning Desktop Tower Defense and Flash Element TD. At Casual Collective, gamers can play a broad range of single and multi-player games for free, meet and join friends in collaborative play, and participate in live chat/forums within a robust community of gamers. Co-founded by Paul Preece and David Scott, Casual Collective features a series of new indie games, now available on the site, as well as across the Web at Kongregate, Addicting Games, Hall Pass, Newgrounds, and I-Am-Bored.com, to name a few. Based in Berkshire, England, Casual Collective is funded by leading venture capital firm Lightspeed Venture Partners. For more information, visit Casual Collective at: www.casualcollective.com.